


The Other End of the Line

by head_full_of_fish



Category: Hunter X Hunter
Genre: Character Death, Gen, M/M, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-09
Updated: 2020-12-09
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:13:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27978645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/head_full_of_fish/pseuds/head_full_of_fish
Summary: A story from Kurapika’s POV after he has finished killing the Phantom Troupe and has been mortally wounded. If he had one last call, just a few moments left in this world, there is only one person that he would want to speak to.
Relationships: Gon Freecs & Killua Zoldyck, Gon Freecs/Killua Zoldyck, Kurapika & Leorio Paladiknight, Kurapika/Leorio Paladiknight
Comments: 8
Kudos: 44





	The Other End of the Line

“Hello? Kurapika? Is that you?”

The phone was sliding from my fingers as I heard the voice buzz through the small speaker. The wetness on my hand was making it hard to keep the phone pressed to my cheek, but I gripped it tighter, my knuckles going cold and white as I clung to that voice.

“Hey, Leorio.” I managed. I hadn’t realized how out of breath I was until I was having to push those words past my lips. The months of silence between the two of us felt like a mountain. One that I was much too weak to try climbing now. Much too late.

“Where the hell have you been? I’ve been trying to reach you for ages! I was starting to think you had died,” a strained laugh, one edged in what I could only identify as relief.

“Who, me? So little faith.” I chuckled, cringing slightly at the pain that motion brought. I think one of my ribs might have been poking into the side of my lung.

“What else was I supposed to think?” Leorio demanded, and I swear I heard something along the lines of “Damned kids,” murmured on the heels of his question.

“Sorry. I was a bit…” I paused, looking around the room from where I laid slumped against the wall. My legs stretched out before me, the white linen of them stained with scarlet and deep brown stains. The remnants of blood both old and new. And beyond those legs-

I shut my eyes before I could register what lay beyond my own body. I wouldn’t spend these next moments thinking about what I had done. Who I had become and where it had led me.

“...busy.” I finally finished, a heartbeat or a lifetime later.

“Well, we’re all busy, you know? Hell, those two idiots nearly went and got themselves killed last month trying to squash some bugs.”

“Bugs?” I asked, a faint smile pulling at the corners of my lips. God knew what the boys had been up to while I was on my quest for revenge. Killing bugs sounded like a far less life threatening way to pass the time than my own, but coming from Leorio, who knew what details may have been omitted. I guess we each had our own pests to dispose of since the last time we saw one another. 

“Yeah,” he continued, “real scary ones, too.” I could hear the weight of all of those omitted details in the tone that my dear friend had whispered those words.

I had missed so much life these past months. The occasional pictures Gon sent of Killua stuffing his face and the countless voicemails left by the man on the other side of the phone had done nothing but serve as bitter reminders that I would never be able to embrace the world that they thrived in. Not while the unpunished still roamed. 

My gaze started drifting back up to the room, but I caught myself. Forcing my eyes to stop at the edge of my toes. Pretending that I didn’t see the still forms at the edges of my vision. Pretending that I didn’t notice the wetness on the ground around my heels chilling and darkening as time wore on.

“So,” Leorio said after a few silent moments, shrugging off that tone that hinted at some tragedy I hadn’t been around to witness, “Where have you been? We need to catch up. You still in Yorknew?”

“No. Not anymore. I left the Boss pretty soon after I last saw you guys. Turns out his daughter stopped being able to tell fortunes after the auction.” Though I suspected she might suddenly find that ability returned, should she ever try again. The image of a now-blank book lying open on the floor flashed through my head. The long fingers that used to flip through its once-full pages lying still and splayed beside it.

“I decided to travel around for a while with Melody,” I continued. I didn’t stop speaking for a while, ignoring the pain in my side and the burning in my throat as I told Leorio about Melody and I trekking across the continent. About the eyes that I had found and the song that she had found a few more scattered notes of.

I didn’t mention when the two of us had separated. The words that she had left me with.

“Your heart is changing Kurapika. Too soon it will sound no different than the hearts of those you seek.” Her words had left me hollowed, but I had not even bid her farewell while she left, slipping out the door at the back of the room. I had just remained staring at the wall of red that glowed faintly, my mind a wasteland.

“You found their eyes?” Leorio’s voice was quiet for once. No. Not quiet, just quieter than the normal boom of it.

My silence was confirmation enough for him.

“You should have called us, Kurapika. We could have helped. Or I could have at least. Those two have been running around nonstop since the last time you saw them.”

“I know,” I said quietly into the phone. My hands were starting to feel cold, but I didn’t want to think about that. “I just had to do this alone.”

Leorio sighed, but a small laugh edged it. I could picture him dragging a hand through his short black hair. He sounded like a man of long suffering, continually having to deal with hard-headed, good-hearted bastards like myself. Thinking about Gon and Killua’s personalities, I had to admit that he probably was constantly dealing with statements like that.

“Well regardless, you’re finished collecting them now, right? Come home Kurapika. We can help from here on, okay?”

Home. That word sounded so beautiful coming out of Leorio’s mouth. I hadn’t had a home in over half a decade. Not since spiders swarmed my village with all their spindly legs and greed-filled eyes.

But there it was. An offer pouring from the lips of the man who had made me laugh and feel something akin to hope for the first time since those spiders had first descended upon my people. 

Home was no longer a village or a place. It was curved black glasses and a red and black briefcase. It was a flute played so beautifully my eyes had not been able to hold back tears. It was the joyous laughter of two boys who had found a piece of themselves in one another amidst the green boots and messy white hair.

“That,” My throat was tight, “that sounds rather nice. I think I could use some help now.” Too little, too late. But Leorio didn’t need to know that I had only learned this lesson the hard way. That I had learned it with too little time to ever put my lesson to use.

Leorio paused for a moment, his voice careful as he asked, “Are you okay? You sound…” He trailed off, the unspoken words so much worse than whatever he could have produced himself.

“Just tired,” I said. I stared blankly down at my legs. I hadn’t realized when the feeling had faded out of them. I was just so cold. My left hand still gripped my phone to my face, and the wetness that had once threatened to send the phone slipping from my grasp had turned tacky. Like all the world was trying to aid me in this last request. This last moment of goodness before the endless night.

“If you say so.” The doubt in Leorio’s voice was apparent. “I won’t believe you until I see you for myself, so stop making me worry and meet us here, okay?” He always had been forward about his emotions. I was so jealous of that. I wished I had the luxury of letting my soul off its leash once in a while.

My vision turned hazy, tinged along the edges with crimson as tears filled my eyes and wound warm rivers down my blood-crusted cheeks.

“Okay,” I croaked out. Another beat of silence. “Hey Leorio?”

“Yeah?”

“Tell me about school. How is it being a medical student?” My hand was slipping down now, the feeling in it fading to black, but I could still hear my friend’s voice as my phone slid to the floor.

“Oh man, Kurapika, you wouldn’t believe how much I have to read! Did you know that the human body has enough blood vessels in it that if you laid them all out in a line it would be almost 100,000 miles? It’s honestly scary. We all contain so much it doesn’t really seem possible.”

Leorio continued, the cadence of his voice as harsh and familiar as always. Listening to him ramble on felt like slipping back into your own bed after spending a week away. The adventure was always good, but slipping back into that comfortable downy always raised you a bit closer to heaven. 

Leorio was in the middle of telling me about his rounds at the pediatric hospital by his school when I cut in, knowing what my slowing breaths meant. Precious seconds left to say the words I wanted to.

“Leorio,” he halted his story.

“What’s up?”

“Just-,” even now, at the end of the rope I had been slowly weaving around myself all these years, the words struggled to come out. “Just know that I love you a lot, alright?”

“Yeah, Kurapika, I love you too.” His response almost sounded like a question. Confusion at the sudden interruption. Plus, I supposed I wasn’t really one to voice my emotions out of the blue like that.

“I have to go now.” Did he notice how far away my voice was now? Could he really hear all of the words that I needed him to hear with the phone, with him, just out of reach?

“I’ll see you soon, okay?”

“Yeah...I’ll see you soon.” The silence wore on, but Leorio didn’t end the call. I faded into the welcoming black, grateful for the escape from the carnage and misery I had surrounded myself within this dark room, and my lungs, my heart, finally stilled.

Somewhere far away, tears began rolling down the cheeks of a man who still refused to hang up the phone, even as the silence persisted. Even as he understood it all too well.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I was just having a *moment* a few nights back and wrote this real quick. I wanted to leave all of the relationships between characters open-ended and up to your own interpretation, so take their conversation however you like!
> 
> Thanks again for reading! Idk if I'll post on here again but who knows. I've been wanting to do some more HxH and Banana Fish content so if you like those hit me up with any suggestions. <3


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